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Targeted TV Ads: Silver Bullet Or Privacy Nightmare?
ericjones12398 writes "The effectiveness of television, as an advertising medium and as a return on investment (ROI), has been constantly questioned since the arrival of the 'digital marketing age.' Not surprisingly, those who are loudest with this concern are mainly high-tech technology companies that are either strong proponents of online advertising — like Google — and/or device hardware manufacturers — like Apple. These organizations hope to 'improve the user experience' by introducing proprietary technologies — usually their own — that can integrate within the existing television environment."
Good luck with that, my TV is only connected to my Adblocked PC.
Highly sugared, caffeinated, low fibre, deep-fried breakfast cereals I see endorsed by /. posters.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
I turned off the cable years ago... anything good on besides Mad Men and Game of Thrones?
[RIAA] says its concern is artists. That's true, in just the sense that a cattle rancher is concerned about its cattle.
So, I'll start seeing porn commercials?
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Oh if only there was a way for me to PAY for TV with no commercials, maybe some kind of CABLE.
At least that was the dream, offer me that service, Cable Guy, before you become utterly obsolete, like film roll containers and tape head demagnetizers.
Actually the death of cable may be inevitable, sort of a mass extinction event where only shit actually worth watching appears on a few channels after all the redundant crap dies off.
Silver Bullet for a Privacy Nightmare?
I would watch one or two targeted ads for 1 hour of TV. Otherwise, I have less boring things to do with my time.
Me: *cracks open a Yuengling beer"
TV: *watches me and scans the room through video camera*
TV: Wouldn't you rather have a Coors Light? If you don't like the taste of beer, Coors has less taste as it is designed to be closer to water.
Me: *Sips some Yuengling*
Me: No thanks TV, I like my beer's taste.
TV: One way or another you're going to taste the silver bullet.
Me: "You'll have to pry my Yuengling out of my cold dead hands."
TV: Okay... *fires a gun at me, wounding me*
Me: "How could TV betray me! These spy cameras were supposed to be innocent and the people who were supposed to be spied on is the enemy."
TV: You betrayed your country by not buying the things in the ads. How will the patriotic television exist if you don't buy what is in the ads? It was either me or you kid.
TV: *fires a few more bullets*
Me: *aaaaarrgh*
TV: "Recording deleted for security concerns"
God spoke to me
No.
This sounds as dumb as Hulu's interactive ads... which I ignore. I have no interest in interacting with some ad disguised as a really lame game.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
Best thing that would improve TV would be a la carte. I would be willing to pay a base fee of $10 for local channels plus 1-2 dollars extra for Syfy, TCM, and..... well that's about it. BUT this would require action by the FCC to force NBC, ABC/Disney, and others to "unbundle" their channels rather than sell them as 6-7 channel groups. They won't do it voluntarily.
Sirius XM radio does a la carte (pay 8 dollars to choose any of 40 channels). No reason digital cable can't do it too.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
You can't -- yet -- adblock television, but Neflix works for now.
December, two years ago, I ditched broadcast TV in favor of Netflix and what I could find online (mostly Hulu). A couple of months later, I caught my young children watching this cool new show they just found on Netflix: Voltron. It brought back memories, so I say down and watched it with them. At one point, the screen darkened. It's the spot where a commercial could've gone, but the video just faded back in and picked up where there story left off. It hit me, there aren't any ads in Netflix shows.
Over the next several months I realized that my children asked less often for toys and other consumer items. Now, a year and a half after switching Netflix, my children only ask for stuff less than a quarter of what they used to do. And what they do ask for are stuff like video games, slingshots, and skateboards.
I realized that cutting them off from the constant bombardment of "Buy! Buy! Buy!" of commercials -- that use psychological tricks -- has short circuited their indoctrination into the cult of consumerism.
Taking commercials out of their lives in one of the best things I've ever done for them (in additional to attentive parenting). I recommend you other parents do the same.
Of course, it never worked on me. Not even when I was buying a can of delicious Coke Zero, now in Vanilla and Cherry.
Crap....
There... FTFY... (no good outcome for watchers)
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
Targeted TV Ads: Silver Bullet Or Privacy Nightmare?
I fall into the category of commercial-hating casual viewer (I don't even have a pay-TV subscription, though I do have a NetFlix subscription) who will do just about anything, legal or not, to avoid commercials.
I also take every step practical to preserve my privacy from the likes of Google and Apple and pretty much any legal-fictional entity described as "incorporated".
So far, Google's - The best of the best - attempts to "target" me via GMail sidebar ads has consisted of a laughable extraction of less-common keywords from my email... And they quite likely have more information about me than any other organization on this planet - Including the US government.
That said, I have found exactly one form of advertising that works on me... If you want to sell me something I already - key point there - want, massively below the normal - normal, not inflated-and-marked-down - price, I'll buy from you instead of through my regular channels (I also have no brand loyalty, so don't bother appealing to me with any sort of "loyalty" "rewards"). But trying to sell me something I don't already want makes me more likely to never buy from you than if I'd never heard of you.
I'd think I'd love to have accurate, per-person ad-tracking, because it might let you turn the whole system on its head:
What happens if you tell the advertiser, in writing, by recorded delivery, that you will charge $500 for every advert they send you. They can identify you uniquely, therefore they know your advertising preferences, and because they know precisely who you are, don't you have a strong case that the very act of sending you ads indicates acceptance of those terms and therefore they have to pony up? After all, this is a contract. "I will be delighted to view as many adverts as you choose to send me, but I charge a $500 fee to review each one." In contract terms that's an offer to treat. (I think that's the term.) And if they then send you, personally, whom they can uniquely identify, an ad, that indicates acceptance of those terms. Conversely they can indicate that they [i]don't[/i] accept the terms by doing nothing - i.e. [i]by not sending ads[/i]. So if you don't want ads at all that's a win-win, AFAICS.
As a second line of attack, create your own ads. Something you find bland and inoffensive. A blank white screen, birds singing, your favorite lolcat or whatever. Set that up as a targeted ad for yourself. Should be cheap, after all you're only targeting one person. Thereafter, the only ads you'll ever see are the ones you chose to see - (For: Mr Anonymous Coward, From: Anonymous Coward Advertising Pty.) - created by yourself.
Project Wonderful does part of this already. You make a bid to Project Wonderful to advertise to a particular audience. The highest bidder is the one to have their ad shown to that audience. That ad continues to be shown until it expires or someone else bids higher. So all you'd have to do, theoretically, is set up your Anonymous Coward Advertising Pty. to work in a similar way to Project Wonderful, and also set them as the default advertiser. So anyone else wanting to advertise to you has to outbid A.C.A.P.'s standard $500, and that will means paying them, presumably. No doubt the TV company would claim a small cut, but you get the rest. And from then on you'll only ever see your own 'adverts' or material from people willing to pay $500+ to pester you.
Will actively block or forgo service.
Maybe I'm atypical, but I've never been interested in the ads on TV, in the newspaper, or online. Throw a trade publication at me though, and the advertising is more interesting because of the products and substance. So my suggestion is that TV advertising is ineffective because it is poorly designed, and that targetting poorly designed advertising isn't going to do much.
Another thing that I've noticed is that a lot of targetted advertising is trying to sell me stuff that I already have. That may be good for keeping customers, but it is worthless when you're trying to persuade new customers to buy your products. That's fine when you're selling consumable products (Coke and Pepsi sorts of things), but probably isn't so useful when you're trying to sell non-consumables (things like cars and insurance).
So if targetted advertising is useless, why would they even want to invade my privacy?
I know I'll end up seeing tons of ads directed at my wife, even when I'm watching TV by myself, as she browses completely open while I make a rather large effort to be extremeley diffucult to track.
It'll be nice to see lots of boobies in bra ads instead of young punks singing some stupid anthem about a 69 calorie beer.
what about theme packs?
so at the very lest if you don't like sports you can dump all the sports channels but still have the all the non sports ones or you can just have the sports channels.
$10-$15 line fee + locals (clean QAM) + all the free shopping and PSA channels.
ESPN pack
ESPN
ESPN 2
ESPN 3
ESPN U
ESPN C
ESPN news
Sport pack 1
In market RSN's + bigten (in market) + pac12 (in market)
Sport pack 2
NFL network and NFL network red zone (free with NFL ST), NBA TV (free with NBA LP),NHL network (free with NFL CI), MLB network and MLB network stike zone (Free with MLB EI)
Sports pack 3
NBCSN, golf channel, CBS Sports Network, speed, Fuel TV, Universal Sports, TVG, HRTV.
Sports pack 4
Big Ten Network (out of market), pak12 (out of market), Fox College Sports, CBS Sports Network.
Sports pack 5
Fox Soccer, Fox Soccer Plus, GOL TV.
Spots pack X
TNT, tru tv,TBS, MSNBC, CNBC (Sports only)
sports pack mega 1-4 as part a deal
sports pack mega with ESPN 1-4 and X as part of a deal.
that is just some ideas on the sports side.
..is about 2020 or so when they have public video billboards lining the downtown sidewalks triggering off your embedded RFID chip. Everywhere you go, nothing but ads for LOGO network, Brokeback Mountain DVDs, "Wicked", and Carmen Miranda banana hats on sale.
All advertisement is evil and should be eliminated. No exceptions.
Bring on the blipverts!
how long before heads start exploding?
If they're something I'm interested in, or remarkably clever. I'm not ever likely to buy insurance from Geiko, but I find their "Possum" commercial hysterical. I might rewind and watch a video game commercial. Once. I probably won't watch that same video game commercial again though. Car commercial? Maybe, but they don't actually advertise the cars I'm interested in. Most of the stuff that I do actually buy, I hear about through word-of-mouth. I've clicked through to Thinkgeek a couple of times from Slashdot. I would probably buy a "laser" if they advertised one of sufficient power (That I could set people on fire with, since doing it with my mind doesn't seem to be working too well.) I don't think I'm really anyone's "target demographic" though. I think I would respond best to adverts for cerebral indie flicks and furry porn. So far, no one seems to be serving those up. Google, get to it!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Just stop watching TV, and do other things instead, like organising a war against CEO's and the 1%.
So now a part of our cable bill is for spying on us as well?? I pay for cable i will not pay to be spied upon.
Jack of all trades,master of none
The problem with targeted advertising to me is that the media companies are going to be so lousy at hitting the mark. After all to offer me a commercial I might like someone would first have to be advertising it. Here's an example. I am a voracious reader of Science Fiction books, spend at least $100 a month of discretionary spending on them so does any author or publishing house have ads for them? None I've ever seen. I'm crazy for Model trains, seen an ad for Atlas or Bachman, Tyco or Lionel anywhere recently? Maybe in Model Railroader Magazine but outside of it? I like classical music and several foreign music groups like BOND, Celtic Women, Blestyachi, etc. So is Columbia music still running mass market ads? Haven't seen one in a hens age and I doubt they would offer me anything I would listen to anyway. I certainly couldn't care less for the latest punk rock, boy band or mass market bleached blond of the moment.
I do drink beer and wine but wine is generally only from local vintners and beer from micro-brew pubs and Imported sources (okay and Yuengling so I'm not a complete elitist snob). None of these sources are likely to be big Madison Avenue accounts.
So exactly what would advertisers "target" me with? I assure you that unless they can hit my soft spot I will make an effort to personally blacklist any advertiser that becomes too obnoxious.
Oh yeah and I stopped watching all TV except for Dr. Who and Warehouse 13 (and an occasional movie with my daughter who has her own Netflix account) two years ago. I listen to Radio and read the Wall Street Journal.
So go ahead Madison Avenue what you got targeted for me? And how you gonna deliver your "targeted" tripe.
The fact is that current advertising techniques are not much more targeted then they've ever been. Only big corporate conglomerates can afford major advertising budgets and so we see the same frigging commercials for the same "Usual suspects" as we ever have. The only beers will be Coors and Bud, The only wines will be mass market, the ads will be mostly about cars or Frito lay snack foods, or public service messages or fast food chains. Bleep them all. Targeted, ha! Targeted my posterior orifice.
You are not immunized against by watching a lot of it. In fact I would contend that the chance is that some of it work on you because you watch it rather than reject it outright. Anyway, I haven't seen ads for a long long time, but when I see one accidentaly, I simply apply the plain old rule "it is an ad: all of it is a lie to make you buy a product you did not need in the first place".
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
Because if I can't ask for no ads, it still isn't targeting me with ads I want to see. If it fails at that, the only success option is to be a successful invasion of privacy.
I would go with the latter ....
AccountKiller
Okay hows about this all the producers create a BT service and
1 you fill out a survey to indicate your interests (im a single hetro geek that has no DL and does not travel so there is a huge whack of ads I DO NOT WANT TO SEE)
2 they then give you a feed with a small number of ad files (say a 8 to 1 ratio of show to ads)
3 you then "pay" for the service either by buying "download credits" or by serving upload data (your BT ratio)
note i am saying DOWNLOAD in an unDRMd format and it is up to you to actually watch the ads (you do have to download them for the Upload Credit but...)
and yes this could be abused on both sides but...
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Hey, stop reading my mind!
Here's a list to get you started: Ugly Americans, Wilfred, Boss, The Venture Bros, Louie, Nurse Jackie, This American Life, Parks & Recreation, The Office, Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Futurama, The Simpsons, American Dad, Family Guy, Cleveland Show, Eastbound & Down, Community, Unsupervised, Walking Dead, Top Gear, and a bunch more.